THQ is dead: cancels all 2014 games including Warhammer MMO, looks for buyers

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Their DLC did not drive them down (actually sounds like been profitable for them, but at the loss of some gamer goodwill) but numerous bombs and porting their uDraw to PS3 and 360. Brian Farrell drove them into the ground.

Their DLC did not drive them down (actually sounds like been profitable for them, but at the loss of some gamer goodwill) but numerous bombs and porting their uDraw to PS3 and 360. Brian Farrell drove them into the ground.

Udraw was stupid they should of just waited for the Wii U it would of saved them a crap ton of money

Their DLC did not drive them down (actually sounds like been profitable for them, but at the loss of some gamer goodwill) but numerous bombs and porting their uDraw to PS3 and 360. Brian Farrell drove them into the ground.

Loss of goodwill is enough to sink any ship. I quit buying THQ products after the way they treated Homefront's devs upon release of that game and the fiasco with all the nickel-and-dime DLC packs for DoW2 Retribution and Saints Row The Third.

I was also a person they ticked off when they nickel and dimed Saints Row 3. Compared to Saints Row 2, it has about half the content, it's campaign is mostly tutorial and unless you buy all the DLC packs, there's less customization options.

This hasn't made me want THQ to burn, but it's made me second guess buying their games day one. Hopefully this is a practice they cut out sharply.

I really don't mind the SR3 DLC scheme. I bought the season pass and didn't care about the rest, since they didn't add any "real" content to the game. The story DLC were totally disconnected from the main plot and I didn't feel that I would have missed out on anything vital if I left them (unlike the Mass Effects, where the main game tells you what you're missing out on). I can see how it may suck if you really want to customize your character to the full extent possible, though. Then again, there were quite a few clothing items already in the game.

It was more that they had said for so long that Saints 3 was a bigger game in every regard than Saints 2. Which it's just not, not even close.

It's usually acceptable that a sequel will contain more than it's predecessor if not an equal amount. Perhaps had they not of been planning to sell the what, 3 to 5 outside the story mission packs, they could've improved the story. Or included the side events they took out.

No idea on other THQ owned developers. That said, Relic and Volition are by far the biggest ones.

The only other THQ owned dev is THQ Montreal, which will probably manage to eke out the WiiU Darksiders 2 port before everything goes down. Don't expect to see the still unannounced game that Patrice Desilets is lead on that they were also working on (I bet Patrice and his team are really regretting letting THQ poach them from Ubisoft right about now).

There's also the unannounced Turtle Rock Studios game. Since that's the only game they're working on, and THQ's been their only source of income during development (despite being independent), if it gets canned they might be in trouble.

Crytek will absorb Homefront 2's cancellation without issue.

I was also a person they ticked off when they nickel and dimed Saints Row 3.

For every one person whining about SR3's DLC scheme, 1000 were buying the DLC. The better than expected catalog sales of SR3 that allowed THQ to beat analyst predictions on how big their per-share losses were this quarter were driven almost entirely by SR3 and WWE '12 DLC sales. DLC wasn't drowning THQ in the bathtub, it was keeping its head just barely above water.

Was it not bigger? I don't know about much about how large the maps are, but I've clocked 39 hours in SR3 and 24 in SR2. I've done quite a few side missions in both and two-and-a-bit of the 3 story DLC:s for SR3. I probably did more aimless roaming in SR3 though, but 15 hours more?

I really liked both of them, I should add. I was a bit put off at first by SR2, since I had played SR3 first and thought that Stillwater was lacking the vivid colors of Steelport, but it really grew on me. It's rarely a good idea to play a game series in the wrong order.

SR2 had 3 unique gangs and one corporation who all had their own story lines in the main story. You took out gangs one by one as opposed to them all being three small gangs who fight for Killbane. Example, the hacker/cyber gang barely play into SR3 until the last quarter of the game and at that they have maybe two or three missions? None of SR2's main story missions were tutorials for activities either and every activity like insurance fraud or crowd control had it's own side story associated with it.

Activity wise SR2 had 14 different unique activities (crowd control, escort, insurance fraud etc) and 7 diversions (streaking, mugging, tagging). SR3 cut the activities to 12 and replaced some of the fun interesting ones with same-y ones already there (mayham and tank mayhem are essentially the same) and in SR2 there are more levels per activity.

There are more weapons in the base game of 2 than 3. 3 possibly got more with DLC.

I didn't like the way the game forced me to play side missions in order to continue the story, though. It disrupted the flow and wasn't logical. If I have enough respect to finish off one gang, I should have enough to at least begin with another (and I'm not sure of this, but did main story missions not give any respect?). I want to be able to do things in my own pace. The side missions in themselves were great, I just don't want to be forced to constantly interrupt the story to play them.

Also, I liked the "leveling" in SR3, although it became a game-breaker once you were impervious to everything.

That's a fantastic article, one I'm familiar with at this point. Dissolving Kaos was probably a wise move financially, but the way THQ treated those guys during the time period leading up to the closure was abominable. After the game was released and the poor reviews started rolling in, THQ forbade Kaos team members from responding to users at the Homefront forums. They removed the community manager and replaced him with a THQ lackey. Long-standing mod threads about game fixes and improvements were left to rot or simply deleted. The once-active forums became a void simply because THQ wanted to hijack any negative press regarding the game. Kaos devs that chose to speak up there were effectively neutered and silenced.

I was involved in the Homefront community from day one, and it became apparent early on that Kaos lost control of the game long before it saw release. It got much worse after the game had been out for a couple months and the critical response had finally been set in stone -- the Kaos devs lost control of patch scheduling and fix decisions, they lost control of DLC makeup and pricing (free DLC? Nope, THQ wanted none of that bullshit), and they lost the ability to communicate effectively with Homefront's player base.

That's the kind of crap I expect from AAA pubs like EA and Ubisoft, not from a "trusted" company like THQ.

Taken from a poster on NeoGAF who is in an advisory position in/with/for THQ:

Interested parties in Saints Row, Darksiders and COH IPs. The only studio that is likely to be saved, at this point, is Volition. Interesting to note is that the party interested in COH is EA. Before you throw up your hands in disgust, it is worth pointing out that they have no issues publishing PC only games and do have their own delivery system. EA also have a presence in Vancouver, where Relic is based.

Taken from a poster on NeoGAF who is in an advisory position in/with/for THQ

Anyone in advisory position in a big company that's willing to drop that kind of info is most likely not in advisory position in a big company, so have your salt shaker ready.

It's pretty obvious the private equity firm THQ is in talks with is meant to patch up the leaking credit hull until Metro, TSOT and, to a lesser extent, CoH ships. As long as creditors aren't banging on the door, a company that big can linger in limbo for a long time, provided there's a carrot, or at least the promise of carrot, at the end of the tunnel.

Anyone in advisory position in a big company that's willing to drop that kind of info is most likely not in advisory position in a big company, so have your salt shaker ready.

I went back and had a look and I can't establish what, exactly, their role is. All I can tell is that they're a (financial?) advisor to someone, I don't believe it to be THQ though. That said, I wouldn't be so sure on the salt shaker. NeoGAF is well known to have industry folk on its board (and is verified) not to mention the fact that if they are working for THQ, do you really think they're not already looking for a job? If anything, having news that a party is interested in something can temporarily boost THQ's (or at least that IP or studio's) worth. It's a net gain with essentially no loss for the person saying it.

It's pretty obvious the private equity firm THQ is in talks with is meant to patch up the leaking credit hull until Metro, TSOT and, to a lesser extent, CoH ships. As long as creditors aren't banging on the door, a company that big can linger in limbo for a long time, provided there's a carrot, or at least the promise of carrot, at the end of the tunnel.

They've already been lingering in limbo for around a year, half at least. Their shares, at time of writing, are worth $1.18 each. THQ might want to be patched up, but no equity firm with at least one intelligent person is going to take the absurd risk of relying on a three games, some way out, to possibly make back their money after they're already loosing tons. Make no mistake, this is it. THQ is done. The birds of prey are already eyeing up what meat they want.

If anything, having news that a party is interested in something can temporarily boost THQ's (or at least that IP or studio's) worth. It's a net gain with essentially no loss for the person saying it.

The opposite actually. THQ is trying hard to make it look as if it's alive and has a future to drum up some extra money (or even sell it's assets at an inflated price). This kind of backstage bomb can only hurt the value of their IP assets. Not to mention anyone with access to that kind of info has to be under NDA.

So even if this guy is right, he's still a moron for saying it out loud.

Originally Posted by The JG Man

They've already been lingering in limbo for around a year, half at least. Their shares, at time of writing, are worth $1.18 each. THQ might want to be patched up, but no equity firm with at least one intelligent person is going to take the absurd risk of relying on a three games, some way out, to possibly make back their money after they're already loosing tons. Make no mistake, this is it. THQ is done. The birds of prey are already eyeing up what meat they want.

Share price is not important as long as it's NASDAQ compliant. The ability to survive until the product, and it's returns, goes live is. They can do it as long as they're not actively being ripped apart by creditors.

And there's a reason THQ went to a private equity firm for money. A PE entity can approve "loans" based on assets a bank would not deem creditable and is much more risk prone. The deal may very well go through. THQ already dropped the other company's name in a press release. That generally doesn't happen if the other party isn't serious about the deal, especially considering the circumstances.